Tag: DETAILS MAKE DIFFERENCE

Again and again, there is the sensuality of the material – how it feels, what it looks like: does it look dull, does it shimmer or sparkle? Its smell. Is it hard or soft, flexible, cold or warm, smooth or rough? What color is it and which structures
does it reveal on its surface?Manfred Sack

To choose the right material. What a complex task!
It has its color. It has its sound. Its temperature. A specific material doesn’t only create a warm or cold atmosphere – it is physically warm or cold.

Different materials feel differently. They are different to touch.

They absorb or reflect sound (waves). They absorb or reflect light.

Even more than light or colors, materials set the mood.

And the stone is probably the most expressive material to use in interiors. Completly rough, natural, or perfectly smooth. So smooth that it becomes reflective. Slippery, if used on floors. Continue reading “About stone coverings”→

There are two ways to organize an apartment: you can either have “one room – one function” situation, or you can combine a few functions into one single, probably large, room. For example, you can design a living room, a dining room, and a kitchen, or you can design one room with kitchen area, dining area, and living area/lounge.

Basically, you can integrate or divide your space. But sometimes, there’s a very thin line between those two possibilities.

Interior design is often focused on the interior space, while actually, borders of that space is where it gets interesting. Borders, like walls or even openings, are what defines the room. They can be completely static and neutral (like walls usually are) or they can bring an extra value to the room. Continue reading “How to use room dividers instead of partition walls”→

It’s been months since we first wrote that designing a kitchen is one of the hardest tasks in an apartment remodel. We’ll be honest with you, there are professional architects who can design amazing buildings, without being able to design a kitchen. A functional, practical and beautiful kitchen.

Because, to design a kitchen means not only to respect technical limitations (plumbing system, electric and gas installations) and to create a functional triangle between main elements, but also to implement client’s requests, to understand general cooking process as well as client’s cooking process, to organize cabinets for a client (which can be especially challenging because we usually have different habits than our clients) and to know what’s the newest trend. Continue reading “How to design a practical kitchen”→

The reason is pretty simple: to design a functional bathroom means to respect some common dimensions of fixtures and space between them.

Now, there may be a lot of things you want to place in a bathroom. But the key is to start simple. And basically, a bathroom consists of three elements: a toilet, a sink, and a shower. Maybe, in the end, you’ll have a toilet, a bidet, a bathtub and double sink – it depends on the size of your bathroom as well as your preferences. But if you think about it, those are just variations of the three basic elements. At the beginning of a design process, you have to start with the minimum number of elements. Continue reading “Step by step guide to a small bathroom design”→

The very beginning of every project is an amazing time. Wonderful and frustrating. When we know everything could happen, but also don’t see it happening. There’s an empty space – maybe an existing apartment to be remodeled, or an empty plot for a new house to be built. And we know what has to fit in that space. But it doesn’t fit.

So we calculate, combine, remove something only to add it again later. We stretch, erase and then draw again. We get angry because it’s impossible. Then we get sad because it is possible, but it doesn’t look good nor feel right. Because it feels forced and unnatural.

Yet every single time, there comes a moment when everything clears up. When we don’t even have to finish drawing the layout to know that we found the solution. That moment is the reason we sometimes find ourselves explaining to our sisters how amazing will be an apartment they’ve never seen, for people they’ve never met.

We feel that same excitement when we see a project like the one we’re about to share with you. Because we know how much effort was put into creating something so simple, so clean, and so impressive. We can relate. We can imagine that moment when everything cleared up during the design process. We can imagine someone over at the Innauer-Matt Architekten saying: “If we move master bedroom to the end of the hallway, we’ll get this clear row of private rooms. Also, bathrooms will be right next to each other to simplify the plumbing system”. Continue reading “Innauer-Matt Architekten designed all-wood family house in a picturesque Austrian town”→

Closets. Don’t you feel like you love every single one you see on Pinterest, but hate your own? Guess lighting is different. Or yours isn’t white? And oh yeah, you don’t see the big pile of stuff that’s taken out of them in order to show „the perfect closet organization“ (also known as the pile of lies, muahahaha hah).

Just kidding. Some people are perfectly organized. Did you ever stumble upon and spent hours and hours going through organization-related projects on I HEART ORGANIZING like we did so many times?

When designing a room, we always advise you to imagine what do you want to do in that room, instead of what furniture you want to put in it. Same thing works for closets. Don’t think about how much drawers you want, but which items you’ll keep in them. Continue reading “Quick tips for closet design”→

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ABOUT US

We are Tina and Petra, two aunts, architects and blog partners at upgradesign.blog.
Our mission is to provide simple, useful and inspirational tips to help you design functional, clutter-free and beautiful personal space.